Yorkshire and the Humber

York St John University were delighted to host the first – and possibly only – Regional Final of the Eurofest events which took place this year at Selby College, York St John University and Leeds Beckett University.
Developed by the Selby Modern Languages Forum, Eurofest is a simulated international trade fair for year 8 pupils. Its purpose is to encourage the active use of modern foreign languages and an understanding of the value of having language skills in a business.
This year for the first time, the winning teams from the top three schools at each event were invited to submit a video showing their performance at the trade fair and summing up what they felt they had learned from it. The Regional Final was the product of collaboration between the universities involved, as well as the Routes into Languages team at the University of Hull.
Schools which submitted a video were Allerton Grange, Beverley High, Brayton High, Holy Family Carlton, Queen Ethelburga’s and Westborough High. The judges were impressed by the enthusiasm and creativity shown in all the videos, but particularly by Westborough High, which won first prize.
The prizes were awarded by the directors of a local company, Yorktour, who shared their experiences of language learning and how this had helped them in their careers, and the evening was rounded off with a performance by Kaminari Taiko Drummers.
Unfortunately the government-funded Routes into Languages scheme has now come to an end, so it is uncertain whether this event will be run next year. However, the organisers are determined that the individual Eurofest trade fairs will continue to be run in the regions.
Many thanks to all the individuals from all the different organisations who collaborated to make this event a reality.

On the 30th of June, the Dept. of Language and Linguistic Science at the University of York welcomed 100 pupils from 14 schools to campus to celebrate the end of the online Language Champions quiz. Over the course of 5 weeks, teams of French, German and Spanish pupils from 38 schools completed a series of weekly factual, language and linguistics tasks based on the theme of the Olympics. As well as answering questions, teams were challenged to use their language skills to devise new sports, posters, captions and chants in French, German or Spanish and to reflect on the way they use and acquire language in a series of linguistic tasks designed to examine loanwords, pronunciation, rhythm and fluency. The judges were impressed by the high quality of entries received and in particular the linguistic ability and creativity of pupils. A massive congratulations to the overall winners of the quiz: Caedmon College Whitby took the gold medal, with Sheffield High and Derby High taking the silver and bronze medals respectively. A special congratulations also goes out to the winners of the individual language and linguistics categories: All Saints RC School (Best Overall French, Best Overall Linguistics), Derby High (Best Overall German) and Balby Carr Academy (Best Overall Spanish). 

On Monday 14^th March the final of the Regional Spelling Bee Competition for Yorkshire and The Humber took place at The University of Hull for the 5^th year in a row. 90 school pupils in Year 7 from 26 different secondary schools from across Yorkshire attended the competition for what was to be a very inspiring day.

All 90 pupils had done exceedingly well to reach the regional final, beating their peers firstly in their class competitions and then becoming one of the final 4 winners from the overall school competition. The event celebrated the joys of learning a language and it was inspiring to see each competitor working so hard to remember and spell the 150 words in their chosen language, either Spanish, French or German.

The first round of the competition took place in the morning and after several tie-break situations, eventually the final four winners for each language succeeded in beating all the other contestants in their category. The afternoon saw the 4 winners in each language battle it out for their ranking of 1^st, 2^nd, 3^rd or 4^th place. The winners will go down to the National Finals in Cambridge at Anglia Ruskin University on Friday 3rd July to compete with other pupils from across the country and represent Yorkshire and The Humber.

The winning schools in the Spanish Competition were:

1^st  place                               Sheffield High School

2^nd place                               St Olave’s School

3^rd place                               Hymers College

4^th place                               The Grammar School at Leeds

The winning schools in the German competition were:

1^{st place}                                                      Beverley High School

2^nd place                               Sheffield High School

3^rd place                               The Grammar School at Leeds

4^th place                               Hymers College

And finally the winning schools in the French Competition were:

1^st place                                Beverley High School

2^nd place                               Beckfoot School

3^rd place                               Sheffield High School

4^th place                               St Olave’s School

Well done to all those Year 7 pupils who did so well in competing in this year’s competition and to those who managed to get to the regional final. Big congratulations also to those pupils who have made it through to the National Final in July. We wish you all the best of luck and we hope you get to bring some trophies back to Yorkshire!

We are delighted to announce that at the Language World Conference earlier this month, Stephen Way, final year Language Studies student (French and Spanish) at Leeds Beckett University won Student Language Ambassador of the Year 2016! 

Many of us know a very special language teacher who inspires pupils through superb teaching and supports colleagues by sharing their expertise and ideas. Or we know a student language ambassador who motivates young learners, showing them that learning languages is exciting, cool and contributes to their future success. The Association for Language Learning and Routes into Languages have worked together over the last two academic years to establish the Language Teacher and Language Ambassador of the Year Awards to recognise and celebrate this talent. The Awards have been generously supported to date by funding from the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE).

Stephen was nominated by Kathy Murdie, who said: "Stephen volunteers for all kinds of opportunities: from promotional work, to visiting schools, to delivering workshops or helping out at languages events. He approaches each job very conscientiously and in a very professional manner... Stephen has devised presentations to pupils to promote the benefits of languages and encourage continued language learning. He has delivered these presentations on various occasions and they have proved very popular. He has also devised a language workshop with some fellow students as part of the University HE days for year 8s. He was linked with a class whilst abroad as part of our Adopt-a-class programme and liaised with the teacher to ensure meaningful communication with the class."

For details of award winners in other categories, please visit http://www.all-languages.org.uk/awards/2016_awards 

Picture shows, from left to right: René Koglbauer, President of ALL and Director of Network for Languages North East, Stephen Way and Kathy Murdie, Project Administrator Languages, School of Events, Tourism and Hospitality, Leeds Beckett University.

Many thanks to ALL and Kathy Murdie for providing copy and photo.